Beauty will save

Beauty in everything

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Beautiful 18-year-old future Princess of Wales Lady Diana Spencer pictured with an English aristocrat Adam Russell, the great-grandson of former Tory prime minister Stanley Baldwin. They are shown relaxing during a group ski holiday in Val Claret in the French Alps in 1979. The old photograph shows Diana lying on a bed in a chalet with Mr Russell, who is resting his book on her shoulder. On the window ledge behind them is a bottle of Johnnie Walker whisky. Mr Russell declined to comment the innocent photo with censorship note ‘Not to be published‘. The Daily Mirror bought the photo two days after Diana’s engagement to Prince Charles in February 1981, it is now being auctioned in the US.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Library photo of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin dated 26/05/23

Library photo of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin dated 26/05/23

Library photo of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin dated 26/05/23.
We can see the handwritten annotation ‘Not to be published’, because the media at the time told that Diana was the chosen one because she had no “history”. This photograph at least suggests otherwise. Eric Caren, owner of the Caren Archive, the largest privately owned printed newspaper collection in the US said: ‘This would certainly not be the way the Royal Family would have wanted Diana to be presented at that moment, given that two days before her engagement had been announced.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana

According to royal author Andrew Morton, Mr Russell went traveling for a year, and when he returned to the UK in 1980 and told a friend that he liked Diana, he was told: ‘You’ve only got one rival, the Prince of Wales’. He tactfully decided not to pursue her, but the pair remained great friends.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Lady Diana Spencer receiving a kiss from a friend at a polo match before her marriage to Prince Charles

Lady Diana Spencer receiving a kiss from a friend at a polo match before her marriage to Prince Charles

One of the late princess’s closest male friends at the time, James Colthurst, once recalled going with her on a skiing holiday around the time in question. He said: ‘She slept on the sofa bed. It was fun. There were lots of pranks – Diana was great company – lovely, outgoing and frivolous and she enjoyed practical jokes.’
One comment to the article – “That guy would probably have been a better choice for her”.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Lady Diana Spencer before marriage

Lady Diana Spencer before marriage

Bidding will take place over the internet between January 17 and 24.
Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Men in her lonely life

Men in her lonely life

Men in her lonely life:

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Diana was deeply in love with James Hewitt, who gave William and Harry riding lessons at Combermere barracks in Windsor

Diana was deeply in love with James Hewitt, who gave William and Harry riding lessons at Combermere barracks in Windsor

People have said rather loftily that Diana needed to be loved. Of course she did. Who doesn’t? Deprived of the domestic happiness she thought she had secured when she married the Prince of Wales, it was perhaps only natural that a young woman should seek to fill that emptiness in the company of other men.
Not, it must be said, that she set out remorselessly on a love quest. She did indeed need warmth and affection, but also, above all, companionship.
The men with whom she was at first most comfortable when her marriage foundered were mainly the Brigade of Guard type – rangy, well groomed and well spoken, understated, and with a gentle, wry humor.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

In the summer of 1989 Diana presented James Hewitt with a polo cup. They had been having an affair for two years

James Hewitt, a Captain in the Lifeguards, was the classic specimen and the only one for whom she has said publicly she felt “love”. He breached their trust with a tasteless memoir. James Gilbey of the distilling family, though, has never talked of the extent of his friendship with the Princess.
Oliver Hoare and Will Carling, who followed, were different. For a start, they were married. Hoare, an old friend of the Prince of Wales, was a sophisticated man who dealt in oriental antiquities. His marriage survived the friendship and the controversy of those “silent” telephone calls to his home.
Carling’s marriage to television presenter Julia did not.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Dashing James Gilbey called Diana ‘Squidgy’ in the notorious taped phone conversation with her

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana and the then England rugby captain Will Carling struck up a close friendship in 1993 after he taught her sons to play rugby

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana and the then England rugby captain Will Carling struck up a close friendship in 1993 after he taught her sons to play rugby

More recently, the men who interested the lonely Diana changed to those with strong family backgrounds, so different from her own. This is what drew her to enjoy the company of Asians such as Dr. Hasnat Khan, the young Pakistani cardiologist at the royal Brompton Hospital, and another Pakistani, electronic tycoon Gulu Lalvani, who took her dancing.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana with art dealer Oliver Hoare at Ascot in 1986. He reportedly met her for secret dinner dates in 1995

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Diana looked carefree and relaxed after a lunch date with hunky tycoon Christopher Whalley in May 1997

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo. Diana and Dodi Fayed

Diana and Dodi Fayed

With Dodi Fayed it was different. She was in love with him. Crucially, he was in love with her. Her search was over. Sadly, it was not allowed to last very long.

Diana Spencer and Adam Russell in Not to be published photo

Sources:
images scanned from newspaper Daily Mail, Saturday, September 6, 1997
dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2257321